Philadelphia Union postgame quotes

Jim Curtin

On thoughts on the game

Yeah, the goals have dried up. You know, we’re struggling. We are getting chances. We’re creating chances, maybe a little more commitment to get in the box; we talked about it at halftime. First half, I thought we just got out competed for probably 40 of the 45 minutes, but that changed in the second-half. I thought we put a lot more into it. You know, probably deserved a goal, but we didn’t get one. So again, the goals have kind of dried up. We are going to have to find a way to fight through it, and we need to now win three games in a row to give ourselves even a chance at the playoffs.

On Sebastien Le Toux’s injury

It’s an ankle sprain; it’ll be day by day. We’ll see how he is, he seems like he’s okay. Not too serious, but again, changes things. But I thought Danny [Cruz] came on and gave us a ton of energy, and caused some havoc and could’ve drawn a penalty kick toward the end of the second half.

On putting Le Toux back in

There was a thought that maybe he could. We wanted to be cautious with it and see if he could run it off, but he said it was at the stage that he needed a sub, so that was it.

On Thursday’s game against Chicago

Chicago’s a team that knows how to grind out ties, that is for sure. On our home field, we’ll have to do a good job committing more numbers into the box. Saw a lot in first half – Conor’s up there fighting with two center backs and that’s not good enough. We have to have more commitment from Chaco, from Vincent, from Amobi to get in the box late. You saw today there’s probably 10 crosses that get knocked down around the 8 to 12 yard line and we don’t have anyone there to get on the end of it. That’s a commitment to getting into the box.

On the commitment to get in the box

Nine times it doesn’t come to you, the one time it does. That’s why Frank Lampard scores a million goals because he has that commitment to run in the box. Those are the plays I’m talking about. It can’t just be Conor in there fighting for things on his own. You can look at the stats and it well tell you: we get a ton of crosses from open play. We just have to do a better job getting guys in there to finish them.

On the DC goal

We don’t give up a ton of chances on the day. If you rewind to the goal, the referee calls a foul throw-in on Ray, which I’m fine with. He threw it from three yards out. But then DC takes the throw-in from the exact same spot Ray gets called for a foul throw. I took issue with that. As I’m yelling at him, there’s a handball on Korb. They do a good job losing mark on the box. DC grinded out a good win, don’t want to take anything away from them. They put a ton into it and their guys deserved to win. So it’s not about the ref.

On Rais Mbolhi

Solid performance. Didn’t have a ton of shots to face.

On Amobi Okugo

I thought Amobi had a good day. Perry and Davy are a handful. They kind of sit back and play balls forward, held their ground. I thought Amobi was decent. He broke up a lot of plays. There’s a couple chances to maybe get in the box for him. We talked about that with him at halftime. He was solid on the day.

On Carlos Valdes

He pulled two off the line. The thing that led to that goal was our backline was a little out of whack. It was off a punt that it happened. Not happy on that part. Is it offside? I’ll have to look at the tape, I’m not sure. But good play by Carlos  on a little bit of a scramble. We were lucky not to be down 2-0 after the first half.

On Brian Brown

He was OK. He was busy. You see that he can open his legs and find ball in the corner. He’s a guy that makes a living in the box. We didn’t get him enough looks in the box. I don’t think he really had a clear one. He’s a guy that just needs one chance, so I’m still high on Brian. It’s just a matter of things drying up for us. But we’ll get back on the practice field and we’ll sort it out. We have 3 games in a row at home now and we have to win all 3. It’s plain and simple.

Conor Casey

On frustration of not scoring

We are frustrated anytime we don’t score. It has been a couple of games now where we have had some decent looks and we didn’t make the most of them today. We need to keep focusing and do better on goal.

It’s just not finishing off our plays. That last pass, last ball just let us down.

Sebastien Le Toux

On his injury

Played the ball off Kemp, and my ankle rolled. After the play, it was a bad roll and I really felt it was a bad sprain, so I couldn’t really push on my foot. As soon as I got up, I tried, but I knew it was not good. I don’t know. We’ll see. We’ll have to take an MRI and see what’s going on. I hope for the minimum, but I don’t really know right now.

On being subbed out

If I could’ve played on it, I would. But I felt it was not possible for me to push hard on my right foot, my strong foot, so I thought it was better to ask for a sub. So we’ll see. I talked with the medical staff and we’ll see what the best thing for me is.

Danny Cruz

On thoughts on the performance

I think today we had a lot of set pieces, got ourselves in positions and cleared the ball away a lot. I think the final ball wasn’t really there, but I think there are positives to take away from it. We know that we have a huge three games now at our home, and if we do the job I have no doubt that we can get into the playoffs.

On the team’s mentality

The playoffs should be in the back of our minds now, and I think that should be the only push that any of us need. You know, when you are playing the game you try to put yourself in the best positions to be successful, and [Curtin] is right, in the end of the first half we didn’t get a lot of numbers in the box. It was Conor fighting guys by himself. We were ripping balls in, but there wasn’t enough people in there. Second half, I really do think we did a better job, we just didn’t finish. I know I had a good opportunity. There was a few good chances off set pieces, like I said, and it wasn’t there. But we now have a few days to get ready for Chicago, someone that is in the East, and if we do our job and get the results at home that we need we’ll be in a good spot.

Is the team feeling frustrated?

I wouldn’t say frustration. I think this team’s done a really good job of late of staying composed, no matter how the game’s gone. I think right now, we’re a confident group. The last two games, we haven’t gotten a goal, and that’s not good. But I do think we’re putting ourselves in positions to be successful. If you look at our record the last few games, it’s pretty phenomenal. We need to focus on that, focus on the positives and get back to the training ground.

Amobi Okugo

Thoughts on the game

We did a good job keeping possession. When we had the chances to play quick, play with the speed of thought, they competed.

I think we’ve just got to mix it up. I think we’re becoming a little too predictable. We need to take risks in the final third, whether it’s being more creative or being more direct, but we have to take advantage of our opportunities. And we didn’t do that.

Brian Brown

On seeing game time again

It feels good to be back in the squad. I’ve been out for three games, so just getting back in training, working harder and trying to convince coach that I’m ready to go. And I did that and I got my chance tonight, and I think I did pretty well, even though we lost.

My job is to score goals. For the past three games I wasn’t in the team, I was a bit pissed. But guys been working hard, so I just have to keep working harder and contribute to the team.

On what needs to be done

We just have to go back to training and do some more finishing. Work on the finishing touch and try to get the first chance, first goal, try to hit the target more. We had five to six shots off target, so we need to do better hitting the target and go back to training and do that.

DC United postgame quotes

Ben Olsen

On the game overall

It would have made life a lot easier if we could have gotten that second goal, and at times I think we can manage the game a little bit better. It’s a good and bad thing at times because we have guys that are just so hungry to go and score goals, and they have the ability to do it.

I can’t say enough about the group in general, how they’ve handled the last two months. They’re tired. It’s been a long haul here. It was a hot day, fittingly hot after all that we’ve been through the last two months. So a lot of these guys had to really dig deep today and find a way to get through it. It wasn’t always perfect, but once again they pulled out a result and a shutout so they’re getting two days off to get away from me and then we’ll back to work for a tough game on Friday.

On Eddie Johnson and Chris Pontius coming off the bench

I thought they both did well. They are bringing a lot to the midfield, and different runs off the top. I thought Sean did well in the midfield. Korb did what he needed to do. Our center backs were strong; Fabi still keeps producing magic and Silva keeps scoring. It’s a good group.

On Silva finding ways to score

His confidence is so high right now, every time he takes on players and he has the quality to do it. He’s got a little bit of everything; he’s calm and his composure is there.

On how is Chris Pontius doing

He’s getting there, I think today was big for him, he pushed through that, especially when we were grinding there in the last 20 minutes. It’s a lot of work to get forward and also to come back and do all the dirty work. I’m happy for him.

Bill Hamid

On how he felt about the overall game

We were hungry, we wanted to go and get it.

On the key to the win

We didn’t give them any chances, I think all together we gave them maybe 3 or 4 chances, which is good in a game.

Looking forward

The more we can stay organized and build off of games like this [the better].

On the keys to success in the playoffs

We want to keep climbing the ladder so we can clinch that number one spot and that’ll give us a lot of confidence going into the playoffs. And playoffs honestly in this league is all about confidence.

On the return of Chris Pontius and what he means to the team

Having him (Chris Pontius) back means a lot. He can play numerous roles. While games go on he can figure out how to turn into a number 10 sometimes playing right behind those strikers. He’s very dynamic and we need that going into a stretch like this because he’s dangerous and teams can’t handle his movement and he can hit a ball from distance or on the move one time. He’s going to be a vital piece for us going into the playoffs.”

Nick Deleon

On overall impression of the game

Overall I’m happy with the result, it puts us 6 points ahead with just a few games left to go so it’s a big win.

On Luis Silva’s form

He’s in form right now (Luis), it seems like everything he touches is going in and he’s peaking at the right time. Hopefully he can keep that going into the post season.

Luis Silva

On his recent hot streak

Yeah it was me in this game, I was able to score but you know I think it’s a group effort.

On what he was thinking as the ball was being crossed into him

I just wanted to keep it on point, it was a good ball and I just wanted to keep it on frame and I did.

Overall reaction to the game

It wasn’t the prettiest game but we got the win and that’s all that matters that’s how the playoffs are going to be.

Sean Franklin

Overall reaction to the game

[Today] was a game where you are going to have to grind it out for 90 minutes and I thought our team did a pretty good job defending the box late in the game, actually the whole game, and that’s what we’re going to need these last couple of games going into the playoffs.”

Looking forward

Every games an important one for us now.

Things to improve upon for next game

Yeah I think definitely being at home we should be able to keep the ball more especially in the second half. A lot of times we went kind of long and we weren’t sharp on our passes as a team and playing at home that’s unacceptable to be giving away the ball that much.